


Chocolate-Hazelnut Coffee and a Kiss

by Cat__Astrophe



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Hurt Tony Stark, M/M, My First Fanfic, One Shot, Past Abuse, Past Child Abuse, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-06-24 19:30:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19730311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cat__Astrophe/pseuds/Cat__Astrophe
Summary: ✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧“You still love him, don’t you?” Pepper questioned with a deadly stare.Steve nodded grimly.“Then prove it.” She declared in a harsh, even tone.✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧Chasing after Tony just so he could apologize, for a whole year-and-a-half, wasn't something that Steve had been planning to ever do in his entire life — but neither was creating this chaotic mess, by leaving Tony behind in the first place.✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧





	Chocolate-Hazelnut Coffee and a Kiss

**Author's Note:**

> ✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧
> 
> Just in case anyone gets confused: There are some time skips and a few flashbacks into Steve's memory which are indicated by a ♡ and the two ✧'s. And although the title of the one-shot sounds fluffy and cute, it's mostly all angst. So read with angsty music playing in the background throughout the beginning and middle, and play fluffy music at the end!
> 
> Thanks to my friend for her invaluable advice and for volunteering to read my one-shot! Thank you to all the extraordinary authors and their marvelous works on both Ao3 and Wattpad for inspiring me to write this one-shot! Furthermore, thank you so much for checking out my one-shot!
> 
> Lastly, this was originally posted on Wattpad on my account: ChaoticCosmos.
> 
> Again, thank you (the reader) so much for choosing to read and explore my very first post on Ao3! Don't forget to leave a kudos and a comment, thanks!
> 
> ✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧
> 
> Love you all 3,000! 
> 
> ( ˘ ³˘)💗
> 
> 𝒞𝒶𝓅𝓉𝒾𝓋𝒶𝓉𝒾𝓃𝑔𝒞𝑜𝓈𝓂𝑜𝓈
> 
> ✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

“You still love him, don’t you?” Pepper questioned with a deadly stare.

Steve nodded grimly.

“Then prove it.” She declared in a harsh, even tone. “If I were to give you one choice, one option, one move, just one simple action, in order for you to express that you still cared for him, what would it be? How would you show that you still loved him after all this time; how would you even start an attempt to win him back in the absolute most sincere, caring, and passionate way possible? What would you do, in a way that you can describe in four words or less?”

Steve’s eyes dimmed in thought as he flicked his gaze up at Pepper, before immediately shifting it down again to study his clenched and sweaty hands.

He opened his mouth to articulate something valuable from the lump in his throat before swiftly shutting it, swallowing a bit of bile down.

Pepper’s ice-cold eyes continued to carve a wound through Steve’s heart and soul as he grimaced, racking his brain for acceptable answers to the redhead’s cruelly specific request.

The college student glanced at each one of his friends in the conference room where they were all currently, patiently awaiting for him to speak. All of them had been kind enough to follow him and support him as he tried to reach out to his once-boyfriend and previous absolute-light-of-his-life. The one who he had lost all because of his own idiotic assumptions.

Suddenly, Pepper received a notification on her phone, paused to see Steve’s intrigued reaction for a moment, before ultimately pulling out her device to review whatever had just interrupted her appointment.

“What are you waiting for?” Bucky hissed in his ear as quietly as he could manage. “Just say that you’re going to apologize or something already!”

“I can’t,” Steve inhaled deep as he responded. “This is Pepper, she’ll be expecting me to say some stupid and cliche answer like saying sorry and it won’t be good enough for her. Anyone else would automatically say that they’re just going to apologize, but any answer that obvious and simplistic is always wrong according to Pepper.”

Natasha grimaced as her gaze traveled to Pepper’s still preoccupied form.

“He’s right, Buck. She’ll be anticipating something ordinary and predictable like that.” She turned to Steve with an unreadable emotion on her face. “Steve, you love him, don’t you? Let that fuel you to come up with a half-decent answer so that Pepper will at least let you catch a glimpse of him, can you do that?”

Steve found his voice shaking with a gut-wrenching combination of fear and heartbreak, “Yeah — okay, — I will.”

His head pounded as his memories raced him back a year to the day that Steve had left early from Tony’s mansion, believing that his boyfriend was ditching him to hang out with one of his stupid ex’s when really, it was actually one of Stark Industries’ most important, private business meetings scheduled that year; one that he was being forced to attend by his father. And when Tony skipped out on the meeting to chase after Steve in a frantic, desperate attempt to apologize, Howard had caught him and decided that on that day he had enough of his son’s behavior.

He had beaten Tony almost to death.

Pepper had been the one to find him outside of her complex’s front door; soaking wet, shivering in rain, and clutching what little belongings that he had managed to take with him at the last minute. His imagination could only picture the image that Pepper must have discerned before her that evening.

Dark bruises littered over his body, and gashes, cuts, scraps, everywhere; most likely etched upon his beautiful face by the glass bottle of liquor that Howard Stark always carried around with him. He possibly had also received a concussion, a few broken ribs, a swollen eye, and he probably had been in so much emotional stress that he couldn’t sit up for at least a week, much less properly sleep and eat.

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

“You LEFT him there!” Pepper’s voice shrill screamed at him from the back of his head as he recalled the day she and Rhodey had stormed into Natasha’s house in the middle of him and his friends lounging around, watching a movie. “You _fucking_ LEFT him there with that _monster_ of a father that he has and you’re just here, lazily sitting around watching a _goddamn_ movie?!”

Steve was about to reply before Rhodey butted in before he could defend himself.

“You were supposed to treat him right! FUCKING HELL, STEVE!” The recent college-graduate howled in the room, and his ears started ringing in reminiscence. “YOU WERE THE ONE PERSON WHO _TRULY_ MADE HIM FEEL SPECIAL AND HAPPY AND YOU JUST FUCKING LEFT HIM THERE?!”

“You do know that he blames himself, right?!” Pepper glared mercilessly at him. “Right now, he’s sitting on my couch, blaming _himself_ for not telling you more about the business meeting that was meant to be a goddamn secret, blaming _himself_ for letting you run off, blaming _himself_ because he thinks that he made you feel not worthy of his attention and his love when he’s actually listening to his father for once, trying to get on his good side, so he could actually have the chance of being with you later on!”

Tony’s friends’ rage echoed around the house as they continued to fiercely holler their opinions of Steve at his guilty face.

“I can’t believe that I had ever trusted you.” Pepper had snapped at him. “ _We_ can’t believe that we had ever trusted you to take care of Tony.”

And then, all of a sudden, Steve had just found himself experiencing the worst day of his entire life. The day that he had lost Tony.

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

That was a whole year-and-a-half ago.

“So Steve, have you decided on that one move that you’re allowed to make?” Pepper cut in on his thoughts.

Tears threatened to leak out of the corner of Steve’s eyes and he wiped them away quickly, silently hoping that no one had seen him.

“I-I…” He faltered.

He had to come up with something to say, and something fast. But not just an easy, effortless answer that a stubborn ex would expectedly blurt out. His response had to be meaningful and showed that he truly wanted Tony back in his life, even if he didn’t deserve him.

And for once, his mind decided to be actually helpful in his despairing situation.

“I would kiss him.” Steve finally determined, his reply coming out in uneven intervals.

Every one of his friends; including Sam, Nat, Bucky, Bruce, Thor, and Clint gaped at him wildly and unbelievingly, with mainly confused looks. Natasha studied his form up and down like Steve had just said the worst thing he could feasibly produce out his mouth.

Pepper just quirked up an eyebrow.

“Why?” She asked straightforwardly, curious at what Steve had come up with in his head. “Why do you plan on kissing him instead of just instantly apologizing?”

“Because…Because it would show him that I cared. That I truly wanted him back. When we were still together, he…he had never liked it when I courteously asked for something and always insisted on giving me whatever I wanted straightaway without having to plead to him. And this time, I’m going to listen to him. I’m not going to beg him to come back to me. I’m going to let him choose whether he wants to listen to me or not because I never gave him a choice when I left him on that day.” Steve shuddered at the honesty dripping from his carefully chosen words.

He resumed, his words becoming softer with each sentence, “I’m not going to beg for his forgiveness, especially since I don’t deserve it. And kissing him will at least give him a hint of how badly I want him back; by showing him that I still love him, that I still care for him, and that all of me has always been his forever, despite what I had done or said before. It’ll at least get his attention. Maybe he’d even be willing to comprehend at least a bit of what I’m trying to tell him. That I just fucking love him so much, and that I had never stopped loving him more than anything on this fucking world. I love him more than my own life.”

Steve drank in the stillness of the conference room as all eyes were on him.

“I really do love him, more than anything, Pepper. If you could just give me a chance to prove it. Just one is enough, and if he doesn’t want to listen, I’ll stop bothering you guys.”

He frankly didn’t want to entertain the thought that Tony might not actually want to even look at his face. He had to seize and hold onto every little and last bit of hope that he and his friends could offer himself.

The redhead lowered her head slightly, pondering the genuineness of what Steve had just confessed.

Abruptly, Pepper looked up to survey his expression. Her face lifted into a minuscule, but true smile.

“That’s a surprisingly really good answer, Steve.” Her eyes brightened up a lot more and she focused on him.

“Thank you for that.” She nodded in appreciation. “That’s all I really needed to hear. That you’re still willing to put in everything you have and could possibly offer to prove that you still love him. That’s all I really wished to hear from you today.”

Steve sighed softly in relief, a surge of hope creeping its way into his heart for a moment before subduing into a strange rest of partially comfort, and the other part full of admiration for the girl who basically ran Stark Industries.

“Thank you for understanding. And for being willing to listen,” Steve added. “And for giving up some of your precious time to hear me out.”

“You’re welcome, Steve.” Pepper took in a calming breath and she flashed him a polite smile. “Why don’t you wait in here until Tony comes back from MIT and then you can try to confront him. If you’re all going to stay, I’ll bring you guys some food and and snacks for lunch, in case you get hungry while waiting for him to get here.”

The entire room nodded in unison.

“Alright.” Pepper pursed her lips. “I’ll pop back in here once in a while to check on everyone, okay? And I’m going to inform Rhodey about your intentions, I hope you don’t mind.”

“You do whatever you think is best, Pepper.” Steve acknowledged her, anxiety faintly beginning to overwhelm him as he thought about how Rhodey would react to him wanting to talk to Tony. “Again, thank you for even letting us into the tower.”

‘Of course.” She started walking towards the door before promptly halting to quickly address him something.

“He really misses you, he really does. I know deep down that he still loves you, although he might not let you onto that at first because he’s still completely broken over the fact that you had just left him without any word whatsoever, but I assure you that he’s still over-the-moon in love with you — no matter how much Rhodey and I have tried to tell him to move on.”

She turned her head halfway before deciding to not see the impression on Steve’s face. Her lips parted to let out a deep sigh that vibrated around the room.

“Just, treat him right this time, okay? He deserves so much more than he believes he does. And truthfully, I trust that you truly are the one to make him see that.”

And with those final words to feed his unsettling guts, Pepper strode out of the conference chamber, her high heels clacking down the hallway towards the elevator before the sounds softly faded into a comfortable silence.

Steve released the breath he had been unconsciously holding.

Now with Pepper’s approval, there was no possible way that he was going to screw his only chance up.

“You did it,” observed Bruce. “You convinced her into giving you a new hope.”

The room’s attention turned to Steve.

“You have to take this opportunity, Steve. If you ever want to see Tony again.”

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

The blond remembered when a month ago, he and his friends had spotted Pepper across a coffee shop in mid-Manhattan. She was ordering two drinks, a coffee and what seemed to be a frappe. Before she could recognize Steve in the crowd of customers, he sprinted over to her to ask her if he could speak to Tony. The redhead’s eyes had hardened straightaway when she had identified Steve as the one talking to her.

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

“No.” She stated, instantly.

“Please, Pepper,” Steve beseeched to her once more. “I just want to talk to him. Just let me see him and explain.”

Pepper delicately scowled but cleared her face of any emotions in order to talk to a cashier of the coffee shop.

“Miss, would you mind if we used the back storage room to talk really quickly, please?” Pepper forced a minute smile.

“Of course, Ms. Potts, take all the time that you need.” The cashier acceded, led them to a door in the back of the shop and unlocked it.

“Tell the manager, I said, ’Thank you’.”

The worker gave them a small bob of her head and left.

Everyone spilled into the room without a word and when Sam shut the door, Steve urged Pepper again.

“Absolutely not.” Pepper announced to Steve for the second time. “You’re not going anywhere near him. You broke his heart, and he’s still feelings the effects of you leaving, even to this day.”

“I know.” He whispered, his head hung down in remorse. “I know what I did to him, and I whole-heartedly know that it was wrong. It wasn’t fair for me to leave him like that. It wasn’t right.”

Pepper almost scoffed, “You’re exactly correct. It wasn’t okay to leave him in such a state of vulnerability and defenselessness, but you never tried to make any of it right. Not only did you leave him there for a few days, but you left him for an entire _year_ , Steve. You haven’t mentioned anything about him to me in so long, that your persuasiveness just doesn’t feel _real_ anymore. If you truly wanted to make it up to him, you should’ve have went to find him as soon as you could.”

“I know,” He repeated, again. “I know I should’ve have went to go find him, but Rhodey just dismissed me every time I went over to Tony’s place to talk. He wouldn’t let me in, no matter what I did.”

“Then that means that you weren’t doing enough, Steve.” Pepper took a sip of her coffee. “Rhodey knows what’s best for Tony more than I ever will and if he’s repulsed by you, then that means you just weren’t good enough.”

Out of the corner of his field of view, Steve noticed Clint shake his head in disappointment.

Steve shut his eyelids in frustration, the aching panic of a declined request arising and swarming up into his lungs. He futilely needed to convince Pepper to let him see Tony, otherwise he had no hope of him ever seeing the genius again.

“Pepper,” He mumbled. “You’re entirely right. You always have been and you always will be, but you’re not aware of what I’m trying to convey. I still love him, Pep.”

Pepper’s expression changed to a petite form of surprise.

“I would do anything just to see him smile again, just to hear him laugh again, I would literally do anything.”Steve rambled, his throat becoming hoarse from the pangs emerging from his lungs. “I can’t get him out of my thoughts, he’s eternally there and it’s killing me not knowing how he’s doing. And I’ve been enlightened that I’m a goddamn asshole for what I’ve done, and I’ve accepted the probability that Tony could quite loathe me right now, but it doesn’t change how much I want him back. And not for the reasons that you think.”

The blond took in a rough gasp of air.

“I don’t want him for his money, or for his fame, or even for just the drama that comes with dating a person like him, I just… I just want his presence. It’s the most colossal thing that I miss about him: his presence.”

He saw Thor who stood to the right of him, beam and gesture for him to resume.

“It’s just… It’s just the confirmation; the knowing that he’s there, alongside me, without a doubt, that he’s there no matter what I’m going to drag him through, that’s what I miss the most about him. The fact that he was loyal to an infinite degree and that he would always be there when I turned around to look behind my back, or when I looked across from our cafeteria table, or when I reached around for him at night and felt his hand grip mine… He would always be there to help me. To… to give me every last bit of his love.”

Steve’s vision began to blur from tears.

“I miss it so _fucking_ much.”

He inhaled a ragged breath.

“I miss him being there for me — after college, after going to the gym, after a god-awful day — I miss him being there, not to comfort me because he knows that I have boundaries, but to just lend me his presence because he knows that that’s what I need the most in the end. I miss everything about him, but it was just his simple _presence_ that made me fall in love with him in the first place.”

A poignant period of silence entered the room and left just as quickly.

“He’s still helpless over you, are you aware of that, Steve?” Pepper said after a while and surveyed him with her eyes. “You broke his heart by leaving him behind to deal with his horrid father and yet here he is, in my home, with his thoughts still tainted of you. Always you.”

Now Steve was unmistakably sobbing. Small tears pattered onto the floor but he didn’t try to hide them. He thought that his chest couldn’t be impaled anymore by his own emotions than it already had been, but he was just proven wrong.

“His heart’s just crushed and shattered into a million pieces, his pride basically crumbled into ashes and dust, yet here he is. Still head-over-heels in love with you. You’re all he ever talks about. All he ever worries about. He never cares whether his own body is functioning decently because he’s too busy wondering whether you really hate him or not, or whether you got out of his house okay without his father finding out about you. He’s obsessed with you like you’re one of his own inventions.”

She looked down at the other cup in her left hand. The one filled with a chocolate hazelnut frappe with chocolate chunks and covered in caramel drizzle: Tony’s secret favorite drink from any coffee shop that could make it.

The redhead continued, “He’s hurt, too. You can see it in his eyes. They flash something unfixable every time he talks about you. I highly doubt anything you try will repair that gaping hole that you had left in his heart a year ago.”

“But I’m willing to try.” Steve harshly whispered, only loud enough for Pepper to hear his message. “I _need_ to try. Please, just give me a chance.”

Pepper looked away from the blond for a minute before fixing her posture to observe him once more.

“He’s…” She stopped for a second. “There’s nothing you can do, Steve. Because you’ve already done enough — and look where he is now.”

His heart twisted into a huge knot and unraveled too briskly. He had realized the effects of him avoiding Tony long ago, even before Pepper and Rhodey had came barging into his house that day. His love for the brunet was too strong to ignore back then and it still is now. But back then his stubbornness had clouded his judgement, essentially causing Steve to fail the one person he had promised to always be there for.

“No.” Steve challenged. “I know I fucked up badly, Pepper, but this is Tony. The Tony who never gave up on me, who persevered through everything that I would fall to my knees to, by myself. He was the one who’s always pushed through his dad just to see me. The one to endure through his torments, his abuse, and listen to him as well as he possibly could… and it was all for _me_. Not only was he persistently just there, unfailingly by my side, but he took care of me like I was the last person on the entire fucking Earth. He…He would watch over me when I was sick, when I had nightmares and memories of my...my mother, when I missed her so much that it was physically impossible for me to do anything else other than cry. He never failed me, and I’m not going to fail him now either, especially when I’m this close to at least possessing a small chance.”

His voice choked on light tears.

“I refuse to leave, I refuse to just give up, because you’re here to at least consider giving me a chance.” He stomached down the sharp stabs occurring in his chest. “I refuse to leave; not when he never left me, not when he never gave up on me, not when he may still love me.”

The redhead’s gaze intensified as he carried on.

“I know I left him that day, I know that I failed him and that I gave up on him, but that hasn’t stopped me from loving him with everything that I have. That hasn’t stopped me from regretting every step I took while leaving his house, that hasn’t stopped me from lamenting every breath I took while my head was still engulfed in exasperation during that day because I know, and have known for so incredibly long that…that if anything, he’s the one who should be annoyed at me for leaving. That he should be the one upset or the one to leave me. But he didn’t. At least he didn’t want to.”

Steve’s mind swept him back to the night that he had left Tony’s mansion and immediately drove to Natasha’s to rant to his friends who were all at her house for a movie night. On that day, Tony and Steve had declined their offer to watch movies with the rest of their friends because they had arranged to go on a date together, before Howard Stark interrupted and ultimately dismantled their plans for the evening.

The moment he had left the Starks’ property, his phone had buzzed with an apology text from his boyfriend. When he didn’t respond, it continued to buzz, his messages inbox rapidly piling up with Tony’s anguished apologies. By the 104th text from Tony pleading Steve to forgive him, he resolved to turning off his phone while he tried to pay attention to the movie that his friends were presently watching. Natasha had suggested that he could sleep over with the rest of the group, and he was quick accepted her invitation in order to avoid the possibility of seeing his boyfriend at his doorstep the next morning. He ignored the genius’ texts all the way until the next evening, and began to skim through all of them while his friends picked out another movie for the following night. When he reached the bottom of his text messages, Steve briefly caught onto the seven last words that hauntingly stared back up at him from his phone screen:

Tony Stark >> I’m so sorry Steve

Tony Stark >> I love y

The brunet had never finished his sentence. He couldn’t because Howard had proceeded to snatch the phone from out of his hands and smash it into the ground, but not before Tony had sent the text. The screen had cracked upon impact, not unlike the way his father then commenced to slam his own son’s body into the ground, beating him until not a spot on him was covered in blood or a bruise, and leaving him to whither in his pain.

Steve had never forgiven himself when he figured out his huge-ass mistake. Neither did he forget the description of Tony’s defeated form that Pepper had ululated at him when she broke into the house to approach Steve about what he had done.

Now, over a year later, he was standing in front of Pepper, stuck with distressed dread as his brain sped through miles of options of what he should say next. He had to say something; anything that could bring him even an inch closer to seeing Tony again, anything that could actually bring him a fighting chance.

“Please, Pepper,” Steve rasped. “I’ve lost everything; my father, my mother, my entire biological family, my discipline, my… my pride. I can’t lose him, too. Not when I’m this close to him. Just give me the key, Pepper, you’re the one holding the key to him, just let me borrow it, just for an hour. Please.”

She still didn’t look very convinced.

“I’m begging you, Pepper. I know I should have done this sooner, I know I should have tried to apologize right after I had left; but I’m doing this now and I’m willing to put everything I have on the line here, I’m honestly willing to. For him.”

Pepper sighed and gave him a pitiful look.

“Fine, Steve. I’ll let you see him, at most for an hour. Alright?” She finally offered. “Even I have to admit that you guys were the cutest and most perfect couple in the room, no matter how much I want to bitch-slap your face right now.”

The blond was encased in a thankful, optimistic, rush of reassurance.

“Thank you so much, Pepper.” Steve painfully respired. “Thank you. Again. I… I promise to do my best.”

“You better.” Pepper threatened him. “Because if you make things any worse between the two of you, I’ll personally make sure that you’ll never forget it.”

He inclined to her declaration in an instant.

Clint suddenly spoke up, “How’s Steve going to reach Tony?”

“Schedule an appointment with me, any time, any day; just be on time.” She told the group as she dusted off her skirt to leave. “And Steve? Good luck. You’re going to need it. After all, we’re all just hoping for the best here. Tony included.”

After her satisfaction was fulfilled with her final remark, Pepper sauntered out of the coffee shop.

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

“Hey Steve,” Pepper momentarily stuck her head through a crack in the door. “I brought you something to increase your chances of winning him back. A peace offering, at most.”

Steve perked up and scrunched his eyebrows in confusion.

Pepper entered the room to reveal a chocolate hazelnut frappe with chocolate chunks that was covered in caramel drizzle in her right hand, complete with a singular straw. She held the delicacy out to him.

“I…” Steve’s gratitude was stolen right from out of his mouth as he gently accepted it. He then proceeded to stare at her in wonder. “I… Thank you. So much. You don’t know how much this means to me, Pepper.”

“Actually I do, because it means just as much as it does to me _and_ Tony. He won’t confess to you any of this, but he really does want you back, despite the trouble that you had left him in.”

Pepper handed out various chips and other snacks to Steve’s friends and left the room just as fast as she had arrived.

Steve felt a flicker of hope ignite in his chest. But it didn’t last very long, and neither did the surge of confidence that had accompanied the flash of hope.

He just missed Tony so goddamn much. He missed his love. So if it meant suffering here in this cold, noiseless conference room wallowing in his own guilt and self-deprecation, would give him an opportunity to see Tony’s captivating eyes just one more time, he would undoubtedly comply.

About a quarter of an hour later, Pepper materialized from the tower’s hallways into the room.

“He’s back.”

This was it.

It felt like Steve’s entire life had led up to this moment. The moment where fate would decide whether he deserved Tony back in his life or not. But he wouldn’t have had to go through this heart-rending situation if only he had stayed and listened to Tony on that day over a year ago. If only he had chosen his fate better back then, then maybe fate would’ve also chosen better for him now.

“Follow me,” Pepper directed him.

Looking back at his friends, who all motioned him to follow the redhead, Steve shot up out of his chair and clambered up after her in an effort to look presentable to the genius. His nerves fluttered thought his stomach but he pushed through them, gripping his clammy hands into fists as he traveled up a few floors in an elevator and approached a grand, metallic door.

“He’s in there. I’ll go in first to warn him beforehand, okay?”

Steve hastily nodded and waited patiently for Pepper to come back through the door, his hands still queasily gripping the drink she had gifted him.

“I told him that someone was here to see him,” She informed Steve’s tense form. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

He flashed her an indebted, appreciative, but uneasy smile before he dived into the bright room.

His heart stopped.

There he was. Tony, with his tousled and casually swept, brown hair, his brilliant and gleaming, chocolate-hazelnut eyes, and his pink-tainted lips which were currently displaying a breathtakingly, entrancing smile.

Steve instantaneously found himself craving the taste of Tony’s lips.

Ignoring his thoughts and carefully setting down the frappe to the side, he shivered out a timid, “Hey Tony.”

The brunet’s smile and jaw dropped.

“Steve...?” His voice was shaky but shortly turned to irritation. “What the _fuck_ are you doing here?”

The blond took a step closer, fully aware of Tony’s charily gaze on him. He took another step. And then another. And then another, until he was directly in front of him.

“Hey, I asked you a quest-“

Tony was cut off by a sudden kiss.

He tried exhaustingly squirming out of it and pulling away in an attempt to fight back before reluctantly letting himself be held by the stronger person, and surprisingly found himself kissing back.

It was chaotic.

Heavenly was the only word Steve could use describe that very moment; filled with longing, yearning, adoration, and neglected love. Nothing on Earth could ever come close to the feeling that he experienced as his lips caught Tony’s in between his; the latter shuffling his hands through the other’s hair as they realigned their positions without separating themselves. His mouth captured Tony’s once more as he pressed their faces closer together, catching a startled gasp come out of the brunet’s parted lips before closing them once more. Coffee and lust flooded his senses, creating a perfect concoction of love and tenderness as their emotions were all singlehandedly captivated within the simple action of a kiss.

Around a fanatical, 14 seconds later, which Steve had counted in his head, he pulled back and cradled Tony’s head in his hands, forcing the genius to pay attention to him.

“I love you. I always had and never stopped. I love you with every little bit of love that I’ve ever fucking have given out to anyone before. I love you more than this fucked-up situation that we’re in, I love you more than this fucked-up relationship that we’re in right now, I love you more than life itself. I love you more than the entire fucking cosmos coalesced together. I love you so fucking much that months could go by with just you occupying my dreams, my head, and my thoughts. I love you more than anything this goddamn universe has to offer me; more than all of the stars in the sky combined, more than any other celestial creation that the universe could ever offer me, more than all of life’s history combined, more than any being could ever even love life. I love you more than I could possibly, ever, in my entire fucking existence, ever tell you verbally. I love you so fucking much that I could never, in all of eternity, ever find a fucking way to describe with my words, or my actions, or my mouth, how much you mean to me, how much I just fucking absolutely love you.”

“Then why did you leave me?” Tony choked as a single tear managed to slip down his skin-soft cheek.

“I don’t regret ever loving you but I do regret never telling you how much I loved you before… before leaving you.” Steve halted and caught his breath but his passion drove him on. “I know you don’t want to hear me apologize and you never liked me pleading with you either, but right now it’s the only way I can explain how I could love you so much but leave at the same time. I never left. Listen to me, Tony, please, because I never truly left you. I never truly left you because you had never truly left me, ever. In all of my fucking pathetic life, you never left my side, you were always there for me; physically or just in my heart, you were consistently there for me, supporting me, encouraging me, _loving_ me. And although I had left you physically, I had never left you behind because you were always, _always_ , in my heart. You have been in my heart ever since I met you and I certainly never let you leave it when I left you that day. You were always there for me, and no matter how badly I wanted to be there for you, no matter how badly I wanted to be by your side through everything life was intending to throw at us — I had left, but only physically. And that’s where I fucked up. I left you behind physically but I would never let you leave my heart. And I never did because I’m here now, to ask you to come back into my heart and my life, but physically because you had never truly left either of them in the first place.”

Tony looked up at Steve with a cautious, but heartfelt expression.

“And please, please, Tony, believe me when I say this,” Steve’s voice quivered. “But I had never meant to leave you. Never for this long, never at all. I was jealous and upset and it made me make the stupidest, most fucked-up decision in my entire goddamn life: Leaving you.”

The two locked eyes.

Their lips latched together again before either one of them could comprehend what they were doing.

It was a moment of absolute perfection. The taste of caffeine reentered Steve’s mouth again as he shut his eyes and clasped the back of Tony’s neck. Their bodies met in the middle and pressed against each other — like polar magnets attracting each other together, like two ends of a knot — after being forced too long apart. He felt his skin shiver from the genius’ bare touch but continued holding onto him, his hunger for his contact growing more evident than ever. A sudden shift of Tony’s figure caused Steve to pick him up and the brunet obeyed by wrapping his legs around the blond. With their posture in Steve’s favor, he diligently slammed Tony into the wall behind him without pausing to disconnect their lips. When they were both drained out of breath, the two detached and rested their foreheads against each other.

Unexpectedly, Steve fluttered open his eyelids, and lovingly beamed down at the flushed person who was wrapped up in his arms.

“By the way, I brought you something to make it up to you. Your favorite.”

Tony looked at him puzzled and wriggled out of Steve’s grasp.

Steve turned around, picked up the frappe, and passed it to Tony.

“Chocolate-hazelnut frappe with chocolate chunks and caramel drizzle,” the genius whispered in disbelief. “You remember.”

“I never forgot. I remember everything about you; your irresistible cuteness, your beautiful blush, and not-to-mention your fucking perfect kisses.”

“Then maybe we should start doing them more often again.” Tony suggested, smugly.

Steve bit his lips, hesitantly. “Are you sure?”

“Steve, I never stopped loving you either. You’ve always been there to push me on through just plain, daily life. You might not realize it but in all of the time that we’ve been apart, all I could think about was how much you’ve ever done for me and how much you meant to me. All I could find my mind drifting to is just the way you smile to cheer me up, the way you pick me up after a fight with my... with Howard, the way you scoot over on your bed to give me room when I just didn’t want to go back to that bastard, the way you just fucking _care_ although you were never entitled to me in the first place. You’re everything I ever fucking wanted but just couldn’t keep, and you’re just so inconceivably perfect because you have every worthy part of me memorized, because every word that you utter makes me want you back even more than morally possible, because every mistake you make, you somehow fix to be better than it ever was before. And now that you’ve brought me _this_ delicious treat, you’re definitely, truly forgiven.”

He licked his lips in thought as he took his first taste of Steve's gift, contemplating both his next words and the exquisiteness of the drink.

“Although I forgive you, that doesn’t mean that I’m just going to drop all these memories down the garbage disposal and forget about what happened. After all, all _this_ , this heartbreak, this tension, this aching, it helps us to learn from our mistakes. But I am, truthfully, willing to forgive you.”

“That’s all I ever needed to hear, Tony.” Steve breathed out. “And just, so I can get it out one last time… I love you.”

Tony advanced forward until he was so close to Steve that he swore he could feel the heat radiating off of him.

“And you know what?” Tony murmured, his lips inches from Steve’s. “That’s honestly _exactly_ , what I was going to say.”

He sighed contently, “I love you.”

Steve beamed lightly as he planted his lips on Tony’s marvelous and sweet-tasting ones once more, cherishing it deeply, as he reached down to grip the genius’ hand.

Abruptly, Steve realized that he may have just discovered his favorite flavor of anything ever created: Chocolate-hazelnut.

“Maybe we should catch up on all we’ve missed being apart this past year.” Steve suddenly proposed after splitting their embrace. “How about getting a coffee together, tomorrow? Preferably a chocolate-hazelnut flavored one?”

“Can I get a kiss to go along with that?” The brunet appealed playfully to the blond as he took another sip from the frappe in his hand. 

“Sure, why not?” Steve grinned, amused by Tony’s directness. “How about tomorrow, at 9?"

The genius pecked his cheek.

“It’s settled then, a chocolate-hazelnut coffee and a kiss. Tomorrow, at 9. Don’t be late.” Tony smirked. “Or else I won’t get either one of what I’ve just been promised.”

Steve, thanking the cosmos for blessing him with the perfection that stood in from of him and the new chance that he had just been granted, chuckled; his voice vibrating with love that erupted from the inside of his chest with every sound he made.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧

**Author's Note:**

> "Heroes are made by the paths they choose, not the powers they are graced with." - Tony Stark
> 
> "It isn't the hero who makes the choices. It's the choices that make the hero." - CaptivatingCosmos
> 
> ✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧
> 
> ( ˘ ³˘)💗
> 
> 𝒞𝒶𝓅𝓉𝒾𝓋𝒶𝓉𝒾𝓃𝑔𝒞𝑜𝓈𝓂𝑜𝓈
> 
> ✧ ─────── ♡ ─────── ✧


End file.
